Pedagogy in Sign of Four

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TCNJ JOURNAL OF STUDENT SCHOLARSHIP VOLUME X APRIL, 2008 ‘HAND IN HAND’: HOMOPHOBIA, XENOPHOBIA, AND PATRIARCHAL PEDAGOGY IN THE SIGN OF FOUR Author: Michael Coppola Faculty Sponsor: Larry McCauley Department of English ABSTRACT The following essay examines the roles of Sherlock Holmes and his colleague, Watson, in the social construction of masculine norms in Arthur Conan Doyle‟s The Sign of Four. This novel includes a description of the courtship and marriage of Watson to Holmes‟s client, Mary Morstan—an act of masculine fulfillment that reinforces hegemonic patriarchal ideals of the time. The novel also supports patriarchal values via subtle homophobic and xenophobic discourse. I argue that the use of such discourse serves to co-localize the feminine, the male homosocial/homoerotic, and the foreign into a suppressed, repressed „other‟ incapable of challenging the patriarchal system. In this process of „othering,‟ the novel inescapably draws attention to the plasticity and vulnerability of its own ideologies. _____________________________________________________________________________________________ Recent scholarship has identified Sherlock Holmes as more than a master of detection. Arthur Conan Doyle‟s legendary creation has become viewed as an enforcer of the ideologies of his time, particularly those concerned with gender roles. In an analysis of “The Speckled Band,” Rosemary Hennessy and Rajeswari Mohan envision Holmes as symbolizing the patriarchal values of Victorian England. By foiling the wicked stepfather‟s plan to murder his daughter, Holmes replaces him and assumes the role of patriarch—a process symbolic of state-sponsored initiatives to act within the private sphere and protect Victorian women from men and, presumably, themselves.1 I want to argue that a similar process occurs in Doyle‟s second Holmes novel, The Sign of Four: potentially
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